Ultimate Outsider

Tuesday, September 5, 2017

I recently had to increase the buffer size setting on my audio interface to eliminate audio glitches in a music project on Cubase Pro 9. Since I almost never have to adjust my interface settings while producing a track, I wondered if perhaps Cubase 9 wasn't performing as well as previous Cubase versions I'd worked with. I searched around for some performance information, but I couldn't find any detailed, up-to-date comparisons of recent Cubase versions- so I decided to do my own.

Cubase versions under test

I decided to test the most recent available 64-bit versions of the last four major Cubase releases:

Cubase 6.5 - Originally released February 2012, the latest version is 6.5.5 from June 24, 2013.

Cubase 7.5 - Originally released December 2013, the latest version is 7.5.40 from Jan 19, 2015.

Cubase Pro 8.5 - Originally released December 2015, the latest version is 8.5.30 from Feb 22, 2017.

Cubase Pro 9.0 - Originally released December 2016, the latest version is 9.0.30 from July 20, 2017.

In addition to comparing basic performance of individual Cubase
releases, I also wanted to examine the effects of ASIO-Guard, a feature
Steinberg introduced with Cubase 7. By using smart management of CPU
time and audio buffers, ASIO-Guard claims to increase the amount of
plugins you can run without encountering audio glitches. Steinberg
claims to have made improvements to ASIO-Guard over time, so I wanted to
see how the feature had changed.

DAW Bench and Test Preparation

I installed each version side-by-side on my PC, patched them with the latest updates, and then downloaded the 2017 versions of the DAW Bench test projects. In case you're not familiar with DAW Bench, it's a collection of DAW projects assembled by audio professional Vin Curigliano to assess a digital audio workstation's ability to reliably produce audio while operating under heavy DSP workloads. When a computer's DSP resources are exhausted, audio suffers, with pops, drop-outs, and strange digital artifacts. Many factors contribute to a DAW system's ability to perform well: CPU, chipsets, drivers, operating system, DAW software, and audio interfaces all play a role.

The current iteration of DAW Bench includes five different Cubase test projects, broken into two categories.

The DSP projects contain some basic audio tracks with literally hundreds of instances of a specific effect loaded up on various tracks. These push your computer's computational digital signal processing capabilities to its limits. The "score" for a DSP test is the number of plugin instances that can be activated without glitching the audio.

The VI projects use instances of Native Instruments Kontakt to test your computer's virtual instrument oscillation/voice generation abilities by playing from hundreds to thousands of simultaneous notes of polyphony. The "score" for a VI test is the number of musical notes that can play simultaneously without glitching the audio.

Each of the DSP projects uses a different freely-available effects plugin:

Windows Optimization: The only Windows performance tweak I made was to select the High Performance power scheme in the Power Options control panel and to disable some unneeded startup processes and services. I have not adjusted any of the more arcane Windows settings such as the MMCSS options.

Cubase Optimization: In all of my tests I use the default Cubase performance settings, with the obvious exception of disabling/enabling ASIO-Guard for a specific round of tests. So this means I'm leaving Audio Priority to Normal, Activate Multi Processing is checked, Activate Steinberg Audio Power Scheme is unchecked (I'm using the built-in Windows High Performance scheme), and on versions of Cubase that offer various "ASIO-Guard Level" settings, I'm using the normal level.

DSP Test Results

The results of the DSP tests are below. For versions of Cubase with the ASIO-Guard features, separate scores are shown with the feature disabled ("no AG") or enabled ("AG"). Cubase 6.5 is the only tested version which lacks that feature.

DSP Test Raw Data (44.1kHz, 256 samples)

DSP Test Chart

The results weren't very dramatic, however they did show modest gains for the ASIO-Guard feature- particularly for versions 7.5 and 9.0. Cubase 8.5 with ASIO-Guard enabled scored the best for 2 out of 3 tests while Cubase 9.0 with ASIO-Guard disabled scored lowest in all three tests.

VI Test Results

The virtual instrument tests were a little more interesting. In the tests below, "VI-CV" are with Kontakt's convolution reverb effect enabled, while reverb is disabled in the "VI-NCV" tests.

VI Test Raw Data (44.1kHz, 256 samples)

VI Test chart

A few things stand out in these tests:

First, ASIO-Guard made dramatic improvements in both Cubase 8.5 and Cubase 9.0, while their ASIO-Guard gains weren't quite as impressive in the DSP tests. The feature shows a clear and demonstrable benefit, at least for some plugin duties.

The improvement ASIO-Guard made on Cubase 7.5 was much less impressive, and I am guessing it's because the Cubase 7.x implementation of ASIO-Guard did not fully support multi-timbral plugins such as Kontakt.

It was also interesting that while Cubase 9.0-with-ASIO-Guard gained the second-highest score in the test, without ASIO-Guard, Cubase 9.0 scored the lowest on these tests. Cubase 8.5 scored significantly higher, in both the ASIO-Guard enabled and disabled tests.

Final scores

I wanted to be able to rank individual Cubase versions in terms of performance, but I didn't want the VI tests to skew the numbers (since the VI scores reach up to the thousands while the DSP scores are all down in the low hundreds). In order to give each test equal weight, I divided the VI test scores by 10, and then I summed all 5 test scores for each DAW and ASIO-Guard setting.

Final Scores (raw)

Final Scores (chart)

With these adjusted performance scores, it appears that Cubase 8.5 with ASIO-Guard is the best-performing version of Cubase in recent years, although Cubase 9.0 still performs very well in second place so long as ASIO-Guard is enabled. However with ASIO-Guard disabled, Cubase 9.0 is the worst-performing version of Cubase of the versions tested.

Conclusions

Cubase 9 performs slightly worse than Cubase 8.5, given the same content and settings on the same system. Without ASIO-Guard, Cubase 9 performed about 4 percent worse than 8.5. With ASIO-Guard there was only around a 2 percent difference.

Core Cubase performance (without ASIO-Guard) has not changed significantly over time. With Cubase 7.5 and 8.5 performing around 1 percent better than Cubase 6.5 and Cubase 9.0 performing nearly 3% worse, Cubase has delivered more or less consistent performance across major releases.

ASIO-Guard can make a big difference, but it depends on the specific plugins and workload. Both Cubase 8.x and 9.x saw huge gains in the VI tests with ASIO-Guard enabled, but the gains were less impressive in the DSP tests.

Cubase makes very good use of multi-core processors and hyper-threading (*). Not all Windows DAWs handle modern CPUs the same, but Cubase has, for some time, been quite good at making use of both physical and logical CPU resources to deliver reliable audio under heavy DSP loads. Here's a screenshot of Windows Task Manager while Cubase is performing one of the DSP tests covered earlier. Every logical core of my i7 5930K is working at the maximum allowed by the Windows MMCSS settings (which reserve 20% of CPU power for background tasks). I plan to explore this stuff a little more in future posts.

(*) As of the time of this writing there is a known issue with Cubase on Windows 10 where Windows imposes a thread limit that can result in audio instability on CPUs with more than 14 logical cores (or more than 7 physical cores). For now, Steinberg recommends using Windows 8.1 or earlier for top Cubase performance on CPUs that exceed 14 logical cores, or using workarounds on Windows 10 which are documented at the above link to at least avoid the audio glitches resulting from this limitation.

Monday, June 12, 2017

In 2016 Nintendo released the NES Classic Edition, an adorable miniature replica of the Nintendo Entertainment System that connects to modern television sets and plays 30 iconic NES games. With an asking price of a mere $60 USD, the thing became a must-have among classic gaming enthusiasts- but Nintendo grossly underestimated demand. Any units that made it to store shelves sold out instantly (usually to scalpers who resold the consoles online at three times the cost), making Nintendo's most popular console in years their hardest to obtain at anything approaching a reasonable price. Nintendo then applied gasoline to the fire by discontinuing the NES Classic Edition altogether in early 2017.

Somewhat heartbroken by the reality that I would never get my hands on one of Nintendo's mini consoles (since I refuse to give scalpers my money), I started looking for alternatives- and I quickly discovered that for not much more money than the original retail price of the NES Classic Edition I could build my own mini NES that played not 30 but 791 NES games- and could also play over 14000 additional games from 37 platforms other than the original Nintendo Entertainment System. So I built one, and now I'm gonna show you how to build your own.

HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

Our ability to make super-cheap purpose-built classic gaming devices is thanks to the Raspberry Pi Foundation, a non-profit organization who developed a computing platform with the goal of making it inexpensive and easy to learn how to make digital products. The Raspberry Pi is a single-board computer that runs a (usually Linux-based) custom operating system, often with a specific purpose. In our case, we'll be using a gaming environment called RetroPie that runs on top of a special Linux build created for the Raspberry Pi.

If you're not a "computer person" or a Linux expert- don't worry. The following instructions will walk you through every step of the process. But for those of you who are interested, the system we are building is based upon the following technologies:

The Raspberry Pi 3 is the computer itself. It's a single board that includes a processor, RAM, audio/video support, and WiFi/Ethernet networking.

The Raspberry Pi 3.

Raspbian is a Linux-based operating system that supports the Raspberry Pi hardware.

RetroPie is a collection of hardware emulators that runs on top of the Raspbian operating system.

EmulationStation is an emulator "front-end" that RetroPie uses to provide an attractive, unified interface for browsing and launching games that you can navigate entirely with your game controllers.

We will be using a pre-built RetroPie image simply called "Nacho's Image" that includes all of the above software in addition to the "ROMs" for literally thousands of classic video games.

BEFORE YOU START

In order to follow these instructions, you will need the following items:

A television set with an available HDMI port.

An HDMI cable for connecting the Pi to your TV (the Raspberry Pi has a standard full-sized HDMI connector).

A computer running Windows, Linux, or Mac OS that can read microSD cards or SD cards (most microSD cards ship with a full-sized adapter). If your computer doesn't have any card reading ports, a USB 3 card reader or USB 2 card reader will do the trick.

A very small Phillips-head screwdriver.

At least 70GB free space on your computer for downloading images and tools.

THE SHOPPING LIST

Depending on which controllers you pick and whether or not you decide to include a wireless keyboard, the cost of building your own fully-functioning supercharged mini NES runs anywhere from $110 to $194 USD- which is less than most people are paying for the 30-game NES Classic Edition on eBay right now. Here are all the individual components you need:

CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 with 2.5A Micro USB Power Supply. ($43 USD). This kit includes the Raspberry Pi 3 board, two heat sinks, and a power supply. (The power supply included in this kit is for USA-style AC/DC household electrical outlets. If you are outside the United States, you might need a kit with a different power supply.)

Buffalo iBuffalo Classic USB Gamepad ($19 USD per controller). These are nice, weighty USB gamepads that work for most of the games included in the RetroPie image. I have two of these, but for a less expensive option there is also the Classic SNES USB Controller 2-pack, which is a $17 USD for two controllers. These aren't as heavy feeling as the iBuffalo controllers, but they do work. In order to control games that work better with analog sticks, the system supports Xbox controllers and many others, as well.

SanDisk Ultra 64GB microSDXC UHS-I Card with Adapter ($23 USD). The Raspberry Pi doesn't have any built-in storage. Instead it reads its operating system and files from connected microSD cards or USB drives. Having a fast microSD card is important because it affects the speed of your Raspberry Pi. A 64GB card is required for the specific RetroPie image I discuss later in this post, but you can get larger or smaller cards if you intend to use different images.

LoveRPi MicroUSB Push On Off Power Switch Cable for Raspberry Pi ($7 USD). The Raspberry Pi doesn't have a power button of its own. This cable sits between your power adapter and the Raspberry Pi, giving you a simple on/off toggle switch, which is much nicer than having to plug the Pi in every time you feel like using it.

OPTIONAL: Logitech K830 Illuminated Living-Room Wireless Touchpad Keyboard for Internet-Connected TVs ($63 USD). While not required for following these setup instructions or for playing most of the console and arcade games in the RetroPie image, some of the computer-based emulators do require keyboard and/or mouse input: ScummVM, Infocom, MS-DOS, for example. You also need at least a keyboard if you want to do any in-depth configuration of the underlying Raspbian operating system. This keyboard is great because it's wireless, has great rechargeable battery life, and has backlit keys. Logitech also makes a much less expensive keyboard (the K400) that is similar but uses AA batteries instead of built-in recharging, and lacks the backlit keys. Honestly any USB keyboard/mouse will do, but I really like the Logitech combo solutions, mainly because they're wireless and only take up one USB port.

ABOUT THE RETROPIE IMAGE I USE

I'm using a RetroPie image called "Nacho's Image" that comes pre-configured with nearly 15,000 games for 38 different consoles and platforms. The image requires a microSD card that's at least 64GB in size. Here's a quick rundown of the image's contents:

Amstrad CPC: 486 titles.

Atari 2600: 647 titles.

Atari 5200: 71 titles.

Atari 7800: 63 titles.

Atari Lynx: 77 titles.

Bandai WonderSwan: 112 titles.

Bandai WonderSwan Color: 95 titles.

Classic Arcade Games: 2158 titles.

ColecoVision: 140 titles.

Commodore 64: 2231 titles.

Commodore Amiga: 2 titles.

DAPHNE (Laserdisc Arcade Emulator): 16 titles.

Infocom (text adventure emulator): 79 titles.

Mattel Intellivision: 212 titles.

MS-DOS: 1168 titles.

MSX Computers: 649 titles.

NEC PC Engine (TurboGrafx-16): 303 titles.

Nintendo 64: 303 titles.

Nintendo DS: 100 titles.

Nintendo Entertainment System (NES): 791 titles.

Nintendo Game & Watch: 54 titles.

Nintendo Game Boy: 490 titles.

Nintendo Game Boy Advance: 1129 titles.

Nintendo Game Boy Color: 528 titles.

Nintendo Virtual Boy: 26 titles.

Philips Videopac (Magnavox Odyssey): 52 titles.

Scumm VM (adventure game emulator): 94 titles.

Sega 32X: 33 titles.

Sega Dreamcast: 3 titles.

Sega Game Gear: 249 titles.

Sega Master System: 267 titles.

Sega Mega Drive: 819 titles.

Sega SG-1000: 68 titles.

Sinclair ZX Spectrum (Timex): 382 titles.

SNK Neo Geo: 155 titles.

SNK Neo Geo Pocket: 49 titles.

Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES): 786 titles.

Vectrex (GCE/Milton Bradley): 21 titles.

Is this stuff legal?
There is no single clear answer on whether it's strictly legal to share and/or use the classic game ROMs included in this image or available elsewhere on the internet. In the United States some of these game ROMs are covered by Fair Use doctrine in the sense that if you own the actual physical cartridge or arcade cabinet you're allowed to keep and use back-ups of those ROMs as you please. But at the end of the day, many of the companies that made these games don't exist anymore, and there is no way to legally purchase the majority of these games in the USA or anywhere else. Most of these titles are essentially abandonware. You can easily remove individual games you're not sure about from the image as needed.

DOWNLOADING AND PREPARING THE RETROPIE IMAGE

In order to download the Raspberry Pi image, you need a BitTorrent client that supports magnet links, and you then need a way to write the downloaded image to your microSD card. There are dozens of free torrent clients and image burning tools for all major operating systems. I will recommend some specific tools I've used on Windows and Ubuntu Linux.

Recommended Programs
All of the utilities I use for these steps are free, and two of them are available for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. My instructions assume you're using these tools.

7-zip is the tool I use to extract 7z, XZ, BZIP2, GZIP, TAR and ZIP files on Windows. There is a Linux version called p7zip-full. (Note: 7-zip isn't required for the specific RetroPie image I'm using for these instructions, but some other images available on the internet need to be extracted before you can burn them to an SD card.)

Instructions (for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS)

Install the latest version of Deluge and Etcher if you haven't already. (If you are running Ubuntu Linux, follow the "Debian and Ubuntu based Package Repository" instructions on this page to install Etcher. You can install Deluge from the command line like this: "sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install deluge")

Select the following magnet link with your mouse and copy it to your clipboard by pressing CTRL+C:

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:

01CC41757907698CEF75FD8BCCFB1407CE1CC4D1&dn=Nacho%27s%20Image.img

Note: The above link may appear on multiple lines in your browser, but you must copy the whole thing (so select both lines of text if it appears that way on your screen).

Launch Deluge. (Windows users: If you are prompted with a Windows Security Alert message
about the Windows Firewall, make sure to that both the Private networks and Public networks boxes are checked, and then click Allow access.)

Click the blue + icon and then click the URL button in the Add Torrents screen. If the magnet link is already in your clipboard it should pre-populate in the "URL" box. If there is no link listed next to URL, just press CTRL+V to paste the link there, and then click OK.

Click Add to close the Add Torrents dialog. The program should now indicate that you're downloading a file called "Nacho's Image.img".

Wait for the download to complete. Note: This could take several hours! Try to avoid quitting Deluge until the image is completely downloaded, but Deluge will resume the download the next time you run it if you ever have to stop the download while it's in progress. You will know that the download is complete when its status changes from "Downloading" to "Seeding."

Insert the microSD card into your computer's card reader. Ignore any prompts to format the drive if they appear.

Launch Etcher and click Select image, and then browse to the directory where Deluge downloaded the image (it defaults to the "Downloads" directory in your user profile, unless you changed this location in Deluge's Edit > Preferences screen). Select the file "Nacho's Image.img" and then click Open.

Click the Select drive button in Etcher. If the program detects more than one potential external drive it will give you a choice. Be sure to choose the card reader containing your 64GB microSD card, and then click Continue.

Once the image and target drive are selected, click Flash! Depending on the speed of your card reader, your computer, and even the card itself, burning the image can take anywhere from a few minutes to a couple of hours.

Safely eject the drive from your card reader. This image is formatted with the Microsoft FAT32 file system, which is readable by all major operating systems, in case you ever need to add or remove games.

ASSEMBLING THE HARDWARE

Hardware setup is the fastest part of this whole project. To reduce the chance of damaging your Pi via electrostatic discharge, try to work on a clean, flat surface in an area with a hard floor instead of carpet.

Unpack your Raspberry Pi board and the heat sinks. Remove the plastic film covering the adhesive under each heat sink and attach the heat sinks squarely on their respective chips. (The big chip is the CPU and the smaller one is for networking.)

Place the Raspberry Pi board between the upper and lower halves of the case, making sure to align the screw holes that fasten the halves together with the holes on the Pi board, and also making sure the ports are facing the correct directions.

- Ethernet and USB ports face the front "cartridge slot" of the Old Skool NES case.- The left side of the case is where power, HDMI, and audio go.- The rear of the case is the location of the microSD slot.

Carefully fasten the two halves of the case together with the included screws, using a very small Phillips-head screwdriver. Do not over-screw.

Connect the Pi's HDMI connector to an available HDMI port on your TV or HDMI switcher.

Firmly insert the formatted microSD card in the slot at the rear of the device. The card will only go one way (note that the Pi's card reader is technically at the underside of the board, so the pins of the card will be facing up when you insert the card).

Turn on your TV set and select the appropriate HDMI input.

Note: Don't plug any game controllers into your Pi yet! We'll do that in the next section.

Plug your power adapter into an available power outlet and connect it to the female connector of your On/Off Power Switch Cable. Then connect the male end of the cable to your Pi's Micro-USB power connector. If the power switch is already in the ON position you will see a bright red LED illuminated on the back of the unit. If the LED is not lit, press the power button to turn the device on. If everything is working properly you should be greeted by the Nacho image's introduction video. (The video's pretty cool, but you will probably grow tired of seeing it every time you boot your Pi. I'll explain how to disable this in a later section.)

CONFIGURING YOUR CONTROLLERS

Now that you've got your image burned and your device assembled you're almost ready to play some games.

After the intro video plays, the RetroPie image drops you into the EmulationStation top menu. The first thing you'll want to do here is connect one of your USB game controllers.

If EmulationStation doesn't recognize your controller, it will prompt you to configure it. You should see a screen like this. Press any button on the controller that you wish to configure.

NoteIf you don't get this screen when you plug in the controller, your controller might already be at least partially recognized. You can press Start on your controller to bring up EmulationStation's main menu, then use the controller's D-pad (plus pad) to navigate down to Configure Input, and then press A to display this screen.

Once you have selected a controller to configure, the "Configuring" screen appears. This screen prompts you to press buttons or move controls in the requested directions so that the emulators know how to map the in-game controls to your individual controllers. Press the corresponding physical controls on your controller as requested, and repeat the process until you reach the end of the list.

ImportantSometimes you might be prompted to use a button or control that isn't physically present on your current controller. In this case, just press and hold down ANY button on your controller until the screen skips to the next control. You won't be able to exit the configuration wizard until you get to the end of the list.

Once you've reached the end of the list and OK is selected, press A on your controller to save the settings for the current controller.

Repeat the above steps for any of the controllers you plan to use. You can re-configure your controllers at any time by pressing Start on your controller and choosing Configure Input from the main menu.

NAVIGATING EMULATIONSTATION AND PLAYING GAMES

EmulationStation is designed to be fully controllable with your game controller. You only need a keyboard (and sometimes a mouse) for specific emulators, or for doing Raspbian or RetroPie configuration.

Once the Pi is fully booted up, you land on the main EmulationStation screen:

Move left or right with your D-Pad to choose which platform/console emulator you would like to use.

Press A to see the list of games available for the selected system. Move down or up with your D-Pad to select a game. If you hold the Up or Down control for a while, the list will scroll very quickly, allowing you to navigate through very long lists.

Once you have selected a game to play, press A.

To exit any game and return to the EmulationStation menu, press START+SELECT on your controller at the same time.

From the game list of any given platform, you can move left or right with the D-pad to cycle through the game lists of other platforms, or press B to return to the main EmulationStation screen.

To gracefully shut your Raspberry Pi down you can press Start on your controller to bring up the main menu and then use the D-pad to select Quit, and press A. Then on the Quit screen, select Shutdown System and press A.

Note: I personally rarely do this. Normally I just toggle the on/off switch on my power switch cable. Knowing this graceful shutdown process is useful in cases where you want to configure Raspbian or RetroPie, though. (You would use the Quit EmulationStation option instead of Shutdown System in these cases. Doing so drops you to a terminal prompt, which requires a keyboard to navigate.)

ADDITIONAL NOTES AND TROUBLESHOOTING

Note: Some of these steps require that you have a USB keyboard connected to your Pi!

Jittery video and audio at first-time use
The first time you connect your Raspberry Pi to your television and start up a new image, it can take a few minutes for the device to completely configure its video and audio settings. So you might notice some flickering video or choppy audio for the first few minutes that you use the system. This should clear up automatically after a short while. If it doesn't clear up, you might need to change some settings in the RetroPie configuration screen.

No audio when connected to an HDMI television set
First off, you should always make sure your TV is powered on and has the right HDMI port selected before powering on your Raspberry Pi. (If you turn on the TV or select the input port after the Pi has booted, the Pi might not detect your TV's audio connection.) Try doing this first (rebooting Pi after the TV is already on and selected) before continuing with the next steps.

The default settings of this image support most HDMI TVs, however some televisions use a different way of "presenting" their audio inputs to connected devices in a way the default RetroPie settings don't recognize. I have had to make the following change in order to get RetroPie to work on one of the TVs in my house.

With the Raspberry Pi powered on, exit EmulationStation by pressing F4 on your keyboard or bringing up the Main Menu and choosing Quit > Quit EmulationStation.

At the command prompt, enter the following command:

sudo nano /boot/config.txt

Navigate down to the line that says "#hdmi_drive=2". Remove the # so the line looks as follows:

hdmi_drive=2

Press CTRL+X, and then press y to save the change.

Type the following command to reboot the device:

reboot

Game doesn't work as expected
While most of the games in this image work great, there are a few that simply don't work, and others that might have special requirements. Here are some things to check and/or keep in mind if a game isn't working as expected:

Some games might require a different controller- for example if your controller has no analog sticks but the game was designed for analog controls, you won't have an ideal experience. Try switching out controllers if you suspect this is the case. I haven't figured out what's required to properly control Nintendo DS games, for example. Most of those games assume you have a stylus for touch control, but I don't know how that translates to the emulator included on RetroPie. If you know the answer, please leave a comment!

Some games/emulators require a keyboard or mouse. For example, all of these emulators assume you have a keyboard connected: MS-DOS, ScummVM, Infocom, VideoPac.

Sometimes the default button mappings might not be what you expect for a specific game. Try using X/Y instead of A/B, for example. Many of the games and emulators have configurable mappings, although the details of this are out of scope for this post. But you might look into custom mappings if you don't like the default control settings.

If you have multiple controllers connected to your Pi, all of them can navigate the main menus but usually only one of them is "Player 1" and another is "Player 2", etc. Make sure you're holding the correct controller if the controller doesn't seem to respond during gameplay.

Some games just don't work right on the Raspberry Pi, or with any current emulator. Try doing a web search for the specific game to see if other Pi users have gotten it to work. The RetroPie image you downloaded is customizable. If you find any games that you confirm just don't work, you can remove them and their associated metadata from your microSD card to free up space for other games.

Stop playing the "Nacho's Image" video every time the Pi starts up
If you'd like to skip the video that plays by default every time this image boots up, you can change this in the RetroPie settings. Note that these settings require a USB keyboard attached to your Pi.

With the Raspberry Pi powered on, exit EmulationStation by pressing F4 on your keyboard or bringing up the Main Menu and choosing Quit > Quit EmulationStation.

Enter the following command (note that unlike Windows, Raspbian is case-sensitive):

cd /home/pi/RetroPie-Setupsudo ./retropie_setup.sh

The RetroPie-Setup Script screen appears. You can use the arrow, TAB, and ENTER keys to navigate menus in this program, and you can also use hotkeys (any letter highlighted in red) where available to select options. On the first screen, select the Configuration / tools option.

On the Choose an option screen, use your arrow keys to scroll down to the splashscreen - Configure Splashscreen option and press ENTER.

Select Choose splashscreen.

Select RetroPie splashscreens.

Choose one of the available splashscreens listed here. I use the one called retropie-2015.png. It looks like this:

After making your selection, you should see a message that says "Splashscreen set to" and the path of the file you selected. Press ENTER.

Exit the RetroPie Setup program. You can do this by pressing Esc or using a Cancel option, where available.

Enter this command to reboot your Pi:

reboot

Enabling WiFi networking
While you do not need to connect your Pi to a network in order to use the preconfigured games in this image, you might want to enable Wi-Fi networking in order to remotely administer and customize your device. There is already a pretty good post about how to do this at the RetroPie site.

Note: When the RetroPie documentation talks about "the Retropie menu in emulationstation" they mean you use the left/right controls on your D-Pad to select RetroPie as if it were a console/platform:

And when you press A from there, you see this menu:

Important: Enabling Security on your Raspberry Pi
Although recent versions of the Raspian OS disable SSH access by default, I have noticed that it is enabled in the RetroPie image that I use. If you never connect your Pi to a network, this isn't a big deal, but if your device is connected to either your Ethernet or Wi-Fi networks, this is a potential security risk. To protect yourself, you should either disable the SSH feature if you're not going to use it or change the device's default password so your device can't be easily overtaken by a scripted attacker.

The raspi-config tool included with Raspian is where you can disable/enable SSH. You can get to it from a command line by exiting EmulationStation and running this command:

sudo raspi-config

You can also access it by selecting RetroPie from the main EmulationStation screen and choosing the "Raspi-Config" option from the RetroPie menu. You control the SSH setting inside the "Interfacing Options" screen of raspi-config. This page explains the process in detail.

You should also change the default password of your device if you ever plan to leave it connected to a network. If you're familiar with the Linux passwd command, you can use that. Otherwise you can use the Change User Password option in raspi-config to do this.

(The default username in Raspbian is pi and the default password is raspberry.)

Sunday, June 4, 2017

I first discovered Plex Media Server when looking for a way to stream backed-up copies of my DVD collection from my Synology Disk Station Network Attached Storage (NAS) device. It seemed like the perfect solution: All I had to do was copy my properly named and organized movie files to the NAS and Plex would serve them up to the Roku devices in my home. Only something annoying kept happening to my uploaded movies as soon as the Plex Media Server added them to my Plex library: Instead of using the nicely-formatted, correct titles that I assigned each of my movie files before copying them to the NAS, Plex consistently replaced their entries in the library with ugly and sometimes meaningless titles instead. For example, Plex renamed "The Sinister Saga of Making the Stunt Man (2000)" to "SINISTER_SAGA.Title1" and renamed "Inspector Morse: Cherubim and Seraphim (1992)" to "DLT16013.Title2".

These changes were confounding, because I followed Plex's instructions for naming and organizing movie files, but the Plex Media Server was clearly ignoring my effort and replacing my tidy titles with... something else. In most cases, Plex's renaming behavior didn't just cause the titles to
look ugly- it also interfered with Plex's ability to
download relevant data for most of the films, particularly the movie
poster box art.

In the below screenshot you can see that plex only identified one of my movie files correctly, while it renamed all of the others with the unexpected title names, and used generic thumbnails instead of downloading the movie posters.

Well it took me several days of research and experimentation (and scouring the Plex forums where some users' independent discoveries helped light the way), but I finally both figured out what was going on and came up with a way to fix it.

ROOT CAUSE

Plex uses a variety of different media detection and matching methods in order to correctly identify titles and download the appropriate metadata (plot summary, box art, etc.). In my case, Plex was doing two different things that were causing my correctly-named files to be renamed once they were processed in the Plex database: First, Plex was ignoring file and folder names in cases where it looked into an individual file's metadata and found a "Title" property in the metadata. Also, the agents Plex uses to identify movies were running in the wrong order for my library settings, so Plex wasn't performing the expected lookup operations in cases where it found the "Title" property in a file.

SOLUTION

I've come up with a workflow that guarantees that when Plex detects your media files it uses online information first, before attempting to look inside your files' metadata for an alternative title. There are three different aspects to this: Your Plex server settings, your Plex library settings, and your individual files- so I will address each of them separately.

Note: I encountered this problem (and fixed it) using Plex Media Server both on my Synology DS214se NAS and on a computer running Windows 7. My NAS has version 1.5.3 of Plex installed and my PC has a slightly newer version, 1.5.6. My steps work the same for both versions/platforms.

Plex Server Settings

You only have to make this change once per Plex server in your home. Ideally you should do this before creating any new Plex libraries, so that your libraries get scanned correctly the first time.

Log in to your Plex server and click the Home icon to go to the Plex server's home page.

Click the Settings icon in the top-right of the page and then click Server to view the Server settings.

Note: If you get a "server settings are unavailable" message, it sometimes helps to sign out from your Plex account (the icon in the upper-right corner of the page) and then sign back in and try again.

Once you're on the Server tab of the Settings page, click Agents and then click Movies.

Below Movies, click Plex Movie. The sub-agents that the "Plex Movie" agent uses when matching media are listed below in order of precedence. The "Local Media Assets (Movies)" sub agent is the one that looks inside your files for the Title metadata tag. Select Local Meda Assets and drag it to the bottom of this list! Also, make sure that Plex Movie is at the top. The "Plex Movie" option cannot be unchecked, but you can optionally check/uncheck the other options in this list. Remember, Plex will use these agents in the order that they appear here.

Correct sub-agent order for Plex Movie agent.

Next, under Movies, select The Movie Database and make the same kind of adjustments: Drag Local Media Assets (Movies) to the bottom of the list and make sure The Movie Database is on the top. You can check/uncheck other sub-agent options if you wish.

Correct sub-agent order for The Movie Database agent.

Click the Home icon to return to the main Plex screen. Under Libraries on the left side of the page, click the ... icon next to your Movies library, then click Refresh All > Refresh. This rebuilds your library using your new server settings. Already you can see a huge improvement in my own library. Note that two titles still have mangled names- that's because neither of these films exists in the Plex Movie database, so Plex fell back on the Local Media Assets agent to extract their metadata. We'll tackle this problem in the "Preparing Your Files" section below.

My library after changing the sub-agent order and performing a "Refresh All."

Plex Library Settings

In order for the Plex server settings we changed to have any effect we need to make sure our libraries have the correct agent settings for the desired media type. In the case of movie files, this means you should select either Plex Movie or The Movie Database.

Editing an existing library

On the left side of the Plex server home page, click the ... next to your Movies library under Libraries, and then click Edit.

On the Edit Library screen, click Advanced and then scroll down to where you can see the Scanner and Agent settings.

For Scanner, select Plex Movie Scanner.

For Agent, select either Plex Movie or The Movie Database. Each agent has some other customization options that appear below.

When you have chosen your desired settings, click Save Changes.

Back on the Plex server home page, under Libraries on the left side of the page, click the ... icon next to
your Movies library, then click Refresh All > Refresh.

Creating a new library

On the Plex server home page, click the + next to Libraries.

On the Select type tab, click Movies and optionally name your library.

On the Add folders tab, click Browse For Media Folder to locate and add folders that Plex will search when updating this library. You can add multiple folders to a single library.

On the Advanced tab, scroll down until you can see the Scanner and Agent settings.

For Scanner, select Plex Movie Scanner.

For Agent, select either Plex Movie or The Movie Database, and check any of the additional options that appear below.

Click Add Library to complete the process and begin scanning for media.

Preparing Your Files

Before you even try to add any movie files to Plex, you should make sure you are following the recommended folder and file naming scheme. Plex's instructions are pretty clear, but it basically boils down to: Put each movie into its own folder, and name the folders and movie files in this format: "Movie Title (year).ext" (Where "ext" is the filename extension of the movie (mkv, mp4, m4v, etc.).

Here you can see that each of my movie files is stored in its own folder, with both the folder and movie file following the same naming convention.

Even after fixing my Plex server settings, some of my files were still getting renamed unexpectedly, and this was because the media files contained metadata tags that had those undesired names in the Title property. Notice the following:

The title on the left (listed as DLT16013) is for a file in my library named "Inspector Morse - Cherubim and Seraphim (1992).m4v". If I locate that file in Windows File Explorer, right-click the file, and go to Properties > Details, this is what I see:

The source of the problem.

To fix this, click the link at the bottom of the Details page that says "Remove Properties and Personal Information". This opens a Remove Properties dialog where you can choose to either just remove individual properties by checking them or creating a new copy of the file with all possible properties removed. I like to choose this second option, and then delete the original file once I make sure that the new file is working properly.

If you choose the "Create a copy" option the new file will have a modified filename. For example, when I removed the properties from a file named "Doomed Flight (1998).m4v" the resulting file was named "Doomed Flight (1998) - Copy.m4v." Plex appears to be smart enough to ignore the "- Copy" part of the filename when detecting media, but if you go this route you might choose to manually trim that text out of the filename before refreshing your library.

If you had to remove metadata in order to fix a problem in an existing library you might have to do a "Refresh All" on the library to force Plex to re-inspect your modified files. I chose to make new copies of my problem files and uploaded them with different filenames (with the "- Copy" still there), and as a result I only had to do a "Update Library" in order to fix the handful of problem entries rather than rebuilding the whole database.

After performing all of the steps above I finally have a Movies library that lists all my movies the way I intended them to appear. The Doomed Flight and Inspector Morse movies still have generic thumbnails since they weren't in any of the movie databases, but at least their titles/years correctly appear in the library now:

I recently had a terribly frustrating problem with the Kontakt 5 sampler incorrectly loading Native Instruments and third-party commercial libraries which took many combined hours of my time to investigate, experiment with, and ultimately fix. I couldn't find any information on the internet that pointed to a solution (or even a cause) for this problem; I was completely on my own. I am documenting the ordeal here for any unlucky travelers who run into the same issue. Please note: I am a Windows user, and I don't know if this problem or its solution translate to Mac OS.

SYMPTOMS

I discovered the problem after applying a patch to Soniccouture's excellent drum library, Electro-Acoustic. Installing the patch is a manual process which requires copying some files into the instrument's Library folder. To test the changes, I launched Kontakt in stand-alone mode and opened Electro-Acoustic, and was greeted by this horrific result:

As shown in the image, all controls from all of the plugin's built-in tabs are visible all at once, rendering the user interface (UI) unreadable. Additionally the highlighted keyswitches shown on the virtual keyboard are all wrong.

Thinking I had perhaps done something wrong when applying the instrument patch files, I tried out a few other libraries. And unfortunately, I discovered that the same issue was occurring in many of them now. Here's Native Instruments Emotive Strings:

Again, all UI elements of the instrument were displayed on-screen at once, and none of them were usable.

I then tested Kontakt in my two DAWs to see if results were any different. Here's what I found:

When launched as a plugin in Ableton Live 9, Kontakt behaved just the same as in stand-alone mode.

It was even worse in Steinberg Cubase 9, though. In Cubase, after opening a new instance of Kontakt and selecting a library, Kontakt would spend some time loading samples, but then would eventually freeze, locking up Cubase entirely. It wouldn't display the instrument UI at all, and since Cubase was unusable, the only way to exit it was to kill the process in Task Manager.

OBSERVATIONS

Here's a quick list of things I observed over the next several days in my quest to solve the problem.

The problem only affected stand-alone mode and new instances of the Kontakt plugin in a DAW, not plugin instances that had already been saved in existing Cubase projects. I even had a couple of projects that used Soniccouture Electro-Acoustic (the instrument I was using when I discovered the whole problem) which loaded and played fine. It was only when I added a new instance of Kontakt to a new or pre-existing project that the issue occurred.

Updating to the latest Kontakt version didn't help. I don't know exactly which version I had installed when I first hit the issue, but I checked Native Access and saw that there was an update available (5.6.8). I installed the update but found that it did not fix my issue.

Uninstalling/re-installing Kontakt didn't work- even if I manually cleaned up left-over registry and file traces that the uninstaller doesn't remove. (Spoiler alert- there was ONE post-uninstall trace of the program that I was overlooking when doing this clean-up. More about this in the "solution" section.)

I normally use Windows 7, but I have another boot partition with Windows 10, that also has Cubase and Native Instruments Komplete 11 installed. When I switched over to Windows 10 and tried loading some of the same libraries that were giving me problems on Windows 7, I found that they worked fine. I also ran Native Access to make sure all my plugins were the same version I was running in Windows 7, so this ruled out the specific version of Kontakt. Version 5.6.8 was not the problem.

Here was the real breakthrough, though: After I switched back to Windows 7 I logged into a different user profile that I hardly ever use. I launched Kontakt in stand-alone mode, and loaded Electro-acoustic... and this time it worked! Both the UI and keyswitches were now working properly! This told me it wasn't an installation problem, but rather something specific to my Windows user account.

On this working user profile, I ran Sysinternals Process Monitor while launching Kontakt and loading the Soniccouture instrument again, watching exactly what Kontakt 5.exe was doing- and this is when I saw it: Kontakt was using a registry subkey that I had overlooked previously, when I was doing manual post-uninstall cleanup of Kontakt. I had already been deleting the Kontakt-related keys under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, but I had forgotten to check for anything under the user-specific portion of the registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER!

SOLUTION

So here's what I did to finally fix the problem:

Make sure no instances of Kontakt are currently running, either as a stand-alone program or a plugin.

Launch regedit.exe and browse to this location in the registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Native Instruments\Kontakt 5

With the Kontakt 5 node selected in the left pane of the window, select File > Export and save a backup copy of the registry contents.

Now right-click the Kontakt 5 node and click Delete on the shortcut menu.

When you are asked if you are sure you want to permanently delete the key, click Yes. (Kontakt will re-create this key with the default program settings the next time it's launched.)

Quit Regedit and re-launch Kontakt.

Load a library that was exhibiting the problem with the UI and/or keyswitches previously. It should now work.

And here was the glorious result:

Good as new!

This also fixed the problem with new instances of the plugin in Live and Cubase. I really hope this post saves someone the time and frustration this problem caused me.

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

When I ordered my i5-based Alienware Alpha R2 it was exactly what I had been looking for: A tiny, near-silent PC that was small enough to fit on my entertainment center but powerful enough to play my favorite games on a big-screen TV. Shortly after making my purchase however, I decided to take my first dip into virtual reality with the Oculus Rift- and I was disheartened when I read the steep minimum system recommendations for the Rift.

While these are Oculus's "recommendations" rather than strict requirements, developers writing software for the Rift are targeting hardware at least as powerful as the components listed by Oculus, and if your hardware falls short your VR gaming experience can be sub-par (or even literally sickening, due to lag-induced motion sickness)- and in my case, both my graphics and CPU were fairly below-spec.

Thus began my upgrade journey.

IS THE ALPHA IDEAL FOR VR?

While I love the Alienware Alpha for what it is- a small, powerful-for-its-size living room gaming PC, it is definitely not the first thing I'd recommend to someone who mainly wanted to play virtual reality games and didn't care about the form factor. There are several reasons for this:

The on-board graphics in all Alpha models released to-date fall short of current VR minimum recommendations. The recommended GeForce GTX 970 is around 32% more powerful than my Alpha's GeForce GTX 960 graphics, for example. (Note: The recommended specs for the competing HTC Vive are a little strange here: They recommend the NVIDIA GeForce 1060- which is ~8% faster than the GTX 970 or the AMD Radeon RX 480- which is ~13% slower!)

Only the i7 models have CPUs that meet minimum VR recommendations. The recommended Intel i5-4590 processor is around 25% more powerful than the low-wattage i5-6400T in my Alpha, based on Passmark CPU scores. (Note: The same Intel CPU is recommended for the HTC Vive, but they also recommend the AMD Radeon RX 480, which is ~20% faster than the i5-4590.)

The Alpha only has one video output. Whichever headset you end up going with (Vive or Rift) is going to require an HDMI port, and you will need at least one other video output to drive a regular monitor. While there are solutions (like this special bi-directional HDMI switch) that let you share a single video output, depending on what you need to do and the specific games/apps you work with, sometimes that's just not going to be enough. Trust me, you want multiple independent video outputs.

While Alienware offers the ability to use higher-end graphics via the very cool Alienware Graphics Amplifier (AGA), this kind of cancels out the primary appeal of the Alpha: its small and sleek design. The AGA is huge and it adds noise.

The Graphics Amplifier introduces some other problems that I'll discuss later, which make the computer less-than-ideal for general use.

If you are thinking about getting into virtual reality and you haven't bought a PC yet, you're going to be better off (both financially and otherwise) by purchasing a VR-certified off-the-shelf unit or building your own desktop with high-end parts. This post is for people like me who already had an Alpha and wanted to make it work for VR.

CLONING AND REPLACING THE HARD DRIVE

When ordering a computer online, I always pick the cheapest storage solution available so I can replace it with the drive of my choosing (you can usually find better after-market storage solutions cheaper than what OEMs charge). In this case, my Alpha arrived with a 500GB Seagate Laptop Thin HDD. The "thin" in the name is accurate, by the way- it is the slimmest 2.5" hard drive I've ever seen, more like an SSD drive in physical size. I replaced it with a Crucial MX200 500GB SATA SSD. Crucial's MX models come with a serial number for Acronis True Image HD, which is a handy tool that I used in the replacement process.

Cloning the factory drive was a bit more of a hassle than I had anticipated, thanks to the computer's UEFI setup and how it affected Windows 10. Here's the whole procedure:
On another PC where I already had Acronis True Image HD installed, I used the Rescue Media Builder feature to create a DVD of the "Acronis bootable rescue media." This is a disc that boots to a Windows-like interface that works largely the same as the installed True Image product.

The thing is, the Alpha's factory configuration does not appear to allow booting from a connected USB device. Users of Windows 8 and Windows 10 are probably familiar with UEFI by now, and how it's increasingly rare to see "Press F2 for system settings" and "Press F12 to select a boot device" options when you first power on a computer. For better or worse, the way this is supposed to work under Windows 10 now is this: Click Start > Settings, search for "Recovery options" and then click Restart now under Advanced Setup, and then click Use a device on the "Choose an option" screen, which should then bring up a "Use a device" screen where you can choose the device to boot from. However, the only boot devices my Alpha reveals are "Onboard NIC (IPV4)" and "Onboard NIC (IPV6)." My connected DVD drive was nowhere to be found.

Here's what I had to do: Click Start > Settings, search for "Recovery options" and then click Restart now under Advanced Setup. In the "Choose an option" screen, click Troubleshoot > Advanced Options > UEFI Firmware Settings > Restart. This got me into the Alpha's setup utility, where I could see where the problem was:

The Alpha's default UEFI configuration for whatever reason doesn't honor connected USB devices. The "Onboard NIC" devices (for LAN booting) were the only internal devices the Alpha exposes (other than "Windows Boot Manager," which is just the option that loads Windows). In order to use my USB disc drive to load Acronis True Image, I had to do the following:

On the Boot tab, choose Disabled for Secure Boot. The setup utility won't let you modify the Boot List Option setting until you do this.

NoteYou'll see a warning that changing this setting may prevent your operating system from booting. (And it will, but we will reverse the situation later.)

Next, change Boot List Option from UEFI to Legacy. (You'll also probably get another warning when you change this setting.) This changes the "Boot Option Priorities" list to a longer list named "Set Boot Priority."

You might expect that would be the end of the clone operation, yeah? But you'd be wrong! See, the factory Windows 10 installation assumes your computer is using Secure Boot and UEFI at boot time, and as a result is not available for booting when the computer's in "legacy" mode. So here's how to reverse the process:

Reboot the computer after the clone operation is complete.

Press F2 when you see the prompt to enter the BIOS setup utility.

Back at the Boot tab, change Boot List Option back to UEFI.

Now change Secure Boot back to Enabled.

Press F10 to save and exit, and allow Windows 10 to boot up from the original drive just to make sure your computer's still configured correctly. If it still works, you can now safely replace the drive.

The rest of the process is super easy. Just disconnect the Alpha, flip the unit on its top, remove four screws, and pop off the bottom plate to reveal the drive housing. Just a few more screws hold the existing drive in place, using a custom mounting assembly. Swap out the old drive for your new one and slap it all back together.

UPGRADING THE CPU

If you have one of the i7-based Alphas, don't worry- you're already set. The i7-6700T processor that ships with R2 models is around 24% more powerful than the i5-4950 that Oculus recommends. (Even the i7-4785T that shipped with the R1 Alphas qualifies, surpassing the i5-4950 by about 5% in raw CPU benchmarks.)

But anyone with an i3 or i5-based model will need to upgrade. Of course this is easier said than done. For one thing, when shopping for replacement CPUs you must make sure to get something that uses the correct socket type:

R1 Alphas have the LGA1150 ("H3") socket, used by Intel's Haswell and Broadwell processors.

Both generations of Alphas use special T-series processors, which are desktop-class processors that draw less power (and generate less heat) than the standard models or top-performance K-series models that Intel offers. The T-series processors are "OEM parts" intended for computer manufacturers and system builders, not individual consumer purchase. You can't buy T-series processors at your local Best Buy, and you will have a hard time finding new, non-refurbished T-series CPUs online at any sort of reasonable price.

The good news is that you can safely install non-T-series CPUs in the Alphas, but this comes with some caveats:

The only processors powerful enough for VR that Alienware has officially approved for use in the Alpha are hard-to-get T-series models. (For the R1s it's the i7-4765T and i7-4785T, and for the R2s it's the i7-6700T.) While non-T processors have been proven to work by Alpha owners like me, using them in your Alpha might void your Dell warranty.

I ended up ordering an Intel i7-6700 processor. The Intel i7-6700K might also work, but it costs more and it wouldn't deliver any better performance. (Anyway, the K-series chips are designed for roomy, well-ventilated PCs with high-end cooling systems, not cramped, air-cooled systems like the Alpha.)

The CPU replacement procedure was quite simple:

Disconnect all cables and place the unit on a clean, flat surface in a static-free environment.

Remove the bottom plate of the Alpha (4 screws).

Flip the unit over and slide off the top cover.

Pop the fan housing off of the CPU and set it aside.

Before removing the heat sink, take note of how it's installed (there's a little gap in one side that has to be in a certain position in order for you to re-assemble the PC later; it's possible to install the heat sink in the wrong direction before you realize what you've done). Then remove the heat sink (4 screws) and set it aside.

Replace the old CPU with your new one. The i7 processors are easy to line up correctly, since they have a marked corner that lines up with the marked corner on the socket.

Apply some thermal compound to the new CPU. I used a slightly-less-than-pea-sized drop of Arctic Silver 5, which has worked out just fine, but I've since read that Arctic MX-2 or Arctic MX-4 might perform even better. (Arctic and Arctic Silver are different companies.)

Clean the old compound off of the heat sink then screw it back into place, making sure it's positioned the same way it was before you removed it.

Replace the CPU fan (and re-connect it if you disconnected it earlier).

Replace the top cover.

Flip the unit back over and replace the bottom plate before plugging everything back in.

UPGRADING THE GRAPHICS

With the R2 generation of Alphas, Alienware introduced the ability for some models to offload graphics capabilities to an external desktop graphics card via the Alienware Graphics Amplifier.

Important: At this time, the only Alienware Alpha models that work with the Graphics Amplifier are those that:

Belong to the R2 generation (ASM200 models, not ASM100).

Have NVIDIA GeForce GTX960 graphics. (Therefore, the models with AMD graphics are not compatible, even though their motherboards have an AGA connector.)

Which graphics card should you use?

Before selecting a graphics card to use in you Graphics Amplifier, you should first check this mini technical support FAQ to see which graphics chipsets have been approved for use with the AGA. Next you have to narrow your selection down to a specific model. While shopping, keep a few things in mind:

The AGA was designed with NVIDIA "reference cards" in mind, which are around 1.5 inches wide, 4.6 inches tall, and 10.5 inches long. Some very long cards might not fit.

The AGA was also designed for blower-cooled cards, which push air along the card's body and out the back of a computer instead of blowing air sideways inside the computer chassis. Here's an example of a blower style card that works in the AGA.

If you're shopping for good cards for VR, remember that you'll want something with enough of the right video ports on it. Most (possibly all?) cards supported by the AGA have at least two ports, but you want to make sure they're the right connectors for your video hardware (monitors, VR headsets): For example, do you need HDMI, DisplayPort, DVI, etc?

I got a good price on this Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1070 G1 Gaming card, which is neither reference-sized nor blower-cooled, and it's working out fine- so don't worry too much if you can't find an affordable card that meets all of the above recommendations. Also, both the Rift and my television have HDMI connections for video/audio, but the card I bought has a DVI port, three DisplayPort connectors, and only one HDMI port. Since DisplayPort has audio support just like HDMI does, I picked up this DisplayPort-to-HDMI cable for my TV connection.

Setting up the Graphics Amplifier

You should read the Alienware Graphics Amplifier FAQ before setting yours up. Alienware updates it with the details on the latest supported graphics cards over time, which is important because sometimes brand-new cards have special driver installation requirements that aren't obvious to most users.

The process was pretty painless for me.

First I checked Dell's Product Support site to make sure I had the latest version of the "Alienware External Graphic Amplifier Software" installed. In my case, I found that I already had the latest version.

Next I used the Check for updates feature on the Drivers tab of NVIDIA GeForce Experience program to check for the latest graphics drivers. There were some updates available, so I downloaded and installed the new drivers.

Next I powered off the Alpha.

I installed my GTX 1070 card in the AGA and connected my television's HDMI In connection directly to the GTX 1070 (via the DisplayPort-to-HDMI cable I mentioned earlier) instead of to the Alpha's video out.

Next I connected the Graphics Amplifier to the Alpha using the special AGA cable.

Finally I powered the Alpha back on and logged into Windows. After I signed on it took several minutes for Windows 10 to reconfigure itself to use the correct driver for the Alpha (the Device Manager said I was just using a generic Microsoft display driver until the drivers were fully configured), but once the driver fully kicked in I was all set.

AGA-related Complications

We'll get to the benchmarks in a bit, but first I wanted to mention a few AGA-related issues I've experienced.

The Alpha cannot enter Sleep mode while connected to the AGA.
The only time I ever actually fully shut a PC down is if I'm about to take it apart (or put it in storage). Instead I configure all my computers that don't have to remain on 24/7 to enter S3 (Sleep) mode when I press the power button, or after a period of inactivity. Sleep mode's much better for me than Hibernation (S4), because a PC can enter and wake from Sleep mode nearly instantly while Hibernation usually takes a fair bit more time.

Anyway, after setting my Alpha up for use with the Rift, I went crazy for a couple of days trying to figure out why I couldn't put my Alpha to sleep. No matter which power scheme I chose in the Windows Power Options control panel, there wasn't even a "Put the computer to sleep" option to set a sleep time-out.

I posted about my problem to the Dell support forum, and unfortunately it turns out that as long as the Alpha is connected to the Alienware Graphics Amplifier, Windows Sleep mode is disabled. I'm pretty unhappy about this, but that's the current state of things. Currently I just shut my Alpha off when I don't need to use it. It's literally the only computer I own or use that I actually have to turn off.

Wake-from-USB is disabled by default (and doesn't work correctly when enabled)
Another thing I like to be able to do is wake my computers by wiggling a mouse or touching a keyboard. I have a number of computers in physically inconvenient locations, but I can wake them up via wireless keyboards/mice because their wireless dongles are USB devices.

Although the keyboard and mouse that ship with the Alpha are wired, the computer comes with a hidden USB 2 port on the underside of the unit explicitly intended for wireless keyboard/mouse dongles. Great, right?

Well, let us for a moment put aside the fact that as long as your AGA is connected to the Alpha, you can't even put your computer to sleep, so there's no point in being able to wake from USB. During the days when I was trying to troubleshoot the sleep problem, I ran across another pretty ridiculous problem.

The Alpha ships with the USB Wake Support option disabled in BIOS. (To enable the feature, you must first disable the "Deep Sleep Control" feature in the Advanced tab, and then change USB Wake Support to Enabled. Note that you probably won't be able to Hibernate after doing this.)

You must disable Deep Sleep Control in order to enable USB Wake Support.

Remember how I said that I have to completely power down my Alpha now, since there's no Sleep option? Well when USB Wake Support was enabled, my computer kept instantly powering back on as soon as it shut down! It would power off and then immediately power back on and start Windows. So I couldn't put the computer to sleep, and I couldn't shut it down either! Needless to say, I re-disabled USB Wake Support once I realized what it was doing.

The USB ports on the Alienware Graphics Adapter are not reliable.
One really cool-on-paper thing about the AGA is that in addition to housing a desktop graphics card, it also serves as a 4-port USB 3 hub. This would be an excellent feature for VR purposes (the Rift, for example, needs 3 USB ports, when you consider the headset, sensor, and game controller), but unfortunately it just doesn't work that well. I'm currently only able to use a single USB port on the AGA reliably; the one for the Rift headset itself. When I have anything else connected to the AGA USB ports, those devices just randomly disconnect and reconnect. The Rift's sensor couldn't even maintain a USB connection long enough for me to get through the initial Oculus setup wizard. Both my Xbox One controller dongle and my Rift sensor are plugged directly into the Alpha's rear USB ports. I've heard other AGA owners complain of this same limitation. It's a real shame.

PERFORMANCE BENCHMARKS

I performed benchmark tests at every step of the way in the upgrade process so I could measure the impact of upgrading the graphics and processor. For reasons I can't explain, I somehow lost the 3DMark scores from the baseline 6400T/GTX960 configuration, however I have Passmark scores from all four CPU/GPU combinations, so I'll do those first:

PassMark PerformanceTest

As you can see, upgrading from the i5-6400T to the i5-6700 alone delivered a 41% gain in raw CPU performance while upgrading from the on-board GTX 960 to the AGA-hosted GTX 1070 resulted in a 36% jump in graphics performance. Passmark doesn't weight 3D graphics too heavily in its overall score, explaining why the final PassMark score is only 23% higher than the base configuration.

The Alpha throttles non-T CPUs.
According to the PassMark site, a standard i7-6700 running under normal circumstances should get a CPU score of 9967. As you can see in my test results on the alpha, my 6700 scored 9069.8 on the 6700/1070 test, which is closer to PassMark's rating of the 6700T, which is 8918. So my Core i7-6700 seems to perform a little better than a 6700T would in the same system- but not by much. I did not try putting my 6700K in the Alpha. I was worried that the Alpha might not be able to rein that one in. I'd like to hear from anyone who's tried it.

Futuremark 3DMark 11

And here are the results from the 3DMark 11 "Performance" suite of tests (these tests run at 1280x720 resolution). Again, sorry I lost the scores for the i7-6400T/GTX 960 combo.

From these scores we can see that as far as gaming goes, the CPU makes the biggest difference in physics computations (34% boost in Physics when upgrading to the i7-6700) while the graphics card upgrade resulted in huge pure graphics gains (60% increase in Graphics score when switching from GTX 960 to the GTX 1070).

Temperatures

A big concern I had before replacing my CPU was TDP- the amount of heat generated by the CPU during normal use. The tiny Alienware Alpha was designed for low-wattage processors for a reason: They generate less heat, and thus don't need huge and complicated cooling systems. I was worried that the higher clockspeeds of the i7-6700 (whose TDP is twice the 6700T) or i7-6700K (whose TDP is 3x the 6700T!) would drive the Alpha beyond its cooling thresholds, resulting in (at best) poor performance or (at worst) physical damage to the CPU and motherboard.

I was pleased to find that the Alpha managed to keep the temperatures in a safe range:

Idle: Average ~44 degrees (C) Recorded range: 39-57

No Man's Sky at 1920x1080 fullscreen: 63 degrees (C) max

Elite Dangerous in VR mode on the Rift: 62 degrees (C) max

VR Compatibility Tests

The actual VR performance of the Alpha has been excellent so far. All native VR titles I've tried with it have worked without a hitch. Here's the whole setup, to give you an idea of scale and space required for both the Alpha and the Graphics Amplifier. At the bottom is the Logitech K830 Illuminated Living-Room Wireless Touchpad Keyboard I got for the setup, so I can use the Alpha from the couch. The wireless dongle is connected to the Alpha's hidden USB 2 port.